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Well, Comcast tried to get Disney in a hostile takeover in 2004, but Disney ultimately rejected the offer. They'll probably try again at some point. Disney will only remain Disney for so long. So, that's from 6 news corporations down to 5 now, and 4 soon, from almost 50 only 40 years ago.

It's really weird that there's no laws in place to prevent this kind of thing from happening, but I guess with corporations pulling the strings behind politicians, it was going to happen eventually one way or another.

At any rate, I plan to move out of the US at some point to get away from this nonsense (and other nonsense).

But there are plenty of places that don't have crumbling empire nonsense

Challenging your assumptions is good for your health, good for your business, and good for your future. Stay skeptical but never undervalue the importance of a new and unfamiliar perspective.Imagination Fertilizer
Beauty may not save the world, but it's the only thing that can

AT&T bought Time Warner last night, and Comcast is about to buy what's left of Fox. With Net Neutrality down, AT&T is free to raise prices for Netflix, or even block it entirely in favor of its newly-acquired "HBO Go", of which Netflix is a direct competitor. Netflix doesn't have the strength to stand up to something like that. The end of Netflix may already be looming on the horizon, and after all the companies acquire each other, it's mission accomplished!

Congrats guys! High fives and beers all around! We're becoming a true dystopian cyberpunk like Netrunner, but without the netrunners!

And then AT&T would lose customers, because people want Netflix. This problem is easily fixed through encouraging competition and stopping municipalities, counties, and states from enforcing monopolies. Big companies succeed in high-regulation environments because they have the infrastructure, knowledge, and money to deal with regulations fairly easily. For a startup, regulations can kill the seed before it sprouts roots. Based on what we've seen of the behavior and competence of gov't agents over the past few years, I'd prefer that they not be anywhere near the internet.

Something I wonder -- and I'm not in "argumentative" mode here, I really do wonder about this -- is whether the divide on this question (and others) comes down to whether one believes that corporations are more dangerous than governments. (Feel free to substitute some other word or phrase than "dangerous" as long as it retains the idea of "can do more damage to citizens.")

The most common defense I see for retaining the FCC's declaration of power in 2015 over broadband companies, as well as for a lot of other regulatory action, is that corporations are by their very nature without ethics. Unless their behaviors are closely monitored and controlled by government agents, they'll take advantage of people every time. Some people take this belief further and hold that capitalism itself is inherently abusive, and more so than other socioeconomic organizing principles. Either way, most folks upset at the FCC ruling that returns oversight of anticompetitive actions by ISPs to the Federal Trade Commission seem to get there from a strong distrust of corporations.

Conversely, the most common defense I see for limiting the FCC's power over broadband providers (and, again more generally, of carefully limiting government regulatory controls) are from people who believe that governments are innately more dangerous than corporations and are more deserving of being restrained. They don't advocate for removing all regulations everywhere, nor do they have some funny notion that corporations are holy and perfect things incapable of stupid and/or harmful behaviors. They just think governments, as the legal holders of lethal force, are inherently more capable of doing harm to citizens than any market-responsive organization of private citizens. And so they conclude that preemptive regulation of ISPs by the FCC is, more than anything else, yet another power grab that ought to be reversed.

Does this seem like a fair description of why we choose the sides we do on this question? If not, is there some other explanation that works better?

You know, yes, I think that does make a lot of sense. It explains the differences in our standpoints very well. You don't trust the government to decide things, and I don't trust corporations to decide things. This is probably why there's such a solid republican/democrat divide on the topic. Democrats are for government, republicans are for corporations.

And me... I'm not sure where I fall exactly! I'm in a somewhat odd spot somewhere in the middle that somehow likes and dislikes both sides at once. I don't really trust the government to decide things, either, Flatfingers. I think everyone in both corps and gov't are all out for themselves. I just feel like the fact that there are/were policies in place to prevent a thing, however flimsy, helped prevent it more than there not being any.

Comcast is already altering their Xfinity Mobile service to take advantage of the lack of net neutrality. Most plans will have all videos throttled to a maximum of 480p -- unless you pay an extra fee. Hotspots on "unlimited plans" will be throttled to 600 kbps,

Always good to read the whole story... and kudos to Ars Technica for honest reporting:

The new speed limits could help Comcast save money on the reselling fees it pays Verizon. In a statement to Ars, Comcast said it's making the changes "to help us maintain the low price point of Xfinity Mobile."
...
"It's important to note that this change won't impact video resolution when using Wi-Fi, where customers will continue to be able to stream in HD," Comcast told Ars. Over Wi-Fi networks, including Comcast's public hotspots, video will play at whatever resolution is streamed by the video provider, a Comcast spokesperson told Ars. Nearly half of videos that stream on Comcast's mobile service play at 480p today, according to the company.
...
While Comcast is imposing the video and hotspot changes shortly after the repeal of net neutrality rules, the rules may not have stopped this form of throttling. The rules banned throttling, but they had an exception for "reasonable network management."

Indeed. To be honest, it's not really as bad as I would have expected. So far, anyway. I can't say I agree with the 480p-unless-you-pay, but I do understand it. I actually have more beef with the fact that their "Unlimited" service isn't actually "unlimited"... but that's been in place for a while now. It's just marketing... although some might argue it's false advertising. (Which it kind of is.)

What I disagree with the most is the hotspot stuff. They throttle to unreasonably slow speeds (that's even slower than my internet) and then the only way to get faster download speed is to switch to their $12 per GB plan. The whole "helps users conserve data" doesn't make any sense at all, either. That's just marketing, I suspect. If you need to download something, you need to download it. It doesn't matter if it's coming at 600kbps or 16Mbps - you have to have it either way. There is no "conservation" there, but if you need to have it in a hurry you're more likely to "upgrade" to the plan that gave you the same thing that you used to have, but costs more. More money in Comcast's pockets.

If the plan was actually unlimited as they claim, you shouldn't have to "conserve data" at all. There should be unlimited data available. Right?